But the real magic of roundups is the relationships that you form with key Influencers in your niche. And it’s relationships with key players in your niche that will take your blog to the next level.

There are six key steps in creating a successful roundup post and I’ll take you through them step-by-step:

Deciding on the Question

Finding the Experts

Finding Email Addresses

Doing the Outreach

Writing the Article

Promoting the Article

1. Deciding on the Question

The question you ask your experts is the most important aspect of a roundup post – it will literally make or break your roundup.

Why is that?

Firstly, the question you ask must be one that your experts want to answer. Influencers and experts are busy people. If they can’t answer your question in about 5 to 10 minutes, they’ll simply pass – they don’t have the time.

Also, if you ask a question they’ve already been asked in half a dozen previous roundups, they may not bother to respond.

Secondly, the question you ask your experts must be one that your target audience wants answered.

So when you write a roundup post you actually have two audiences – experts and target audience – and they both need to be motivated by your question.

1.1 Use Your Own Learning Process

If you are a blogger and you have a following, it’s more than likely that you are teaching people how to do things. You may be only one or two steps ahead of your readers (you only need to be one step ahead of someone else in order to help them).

This means that your problems are very likely their problems. So keep a detailed diary of the challenges and problems that you face and overcome as you build your blog.

You can use those challenges and problems as the basis for roundup questions. For example: “What’s you number one list-building technique?” or “What’s your single most important source of traffic?” or “What are the three digital marketing tools you couldn’t do without?”

1.2 Use BuzzSumo to find trending topics

Let’s say your broad topic is ‘email marketing’ but you want to narrow it down to a sub-topic. Go to BuzzSumo and type in ‘email marketing’.

In the left panel, set the filter to ‘last 6 months’ to ensure relevancy:

In the top 10 results I can see that ‘email etiquette’ is the trending topic within ‘email marketing’:

I cast my eye over the titles of these articles and bingo! I’ve got the question for my roundup post: “What’s the single most important aspect of email etiquette for a web marketer?”

1.3 Be Very Specific

Ask ONE thing only. The more specific your question, the more likely your Influencers and experts will respond.

Avoid vague questions like “what’s your view on guest posting?” Instead ask: “What’s the most valuable guest posting tip you could offer to a novice blogger?”

One way to make a question more specific is to add a date. Instead of asking: “What are the best blog promotion techniques”, ask: “What are the best blog promotion techniques in 2017?”

1.4 Always Indicate the Target Audience

Your experts will find it much easier to respond to your question if you clearly indicate the target audience. It goes back to the previous point – being as specific as you can.

For example, this question is okay, but it doesn’t indicate the target audience: “What’s your single most valuable piece of blogging advice?”

This is the same question, but with the target audience specified: “What’s the single most valuable piece of advice you would give to a first-year blogger?”

The second version is much more likely to get a response from an expert, because it’s more specific.

Not only that, once the article is published it’s more likely to be shared and go viral because it has a very specific audience: first year bloggers.

Here’s another example.

Instead of asking: “What are your best list building techniques?” ask: “What key tip would you give to a first year blogger trying to get their first 1000 subscribers?”

This is an easier question to answer because (a) you’re asking for just one tip, and (b) it’s a tip for first year bloggers who don’t yet have 1000 subscribers.

Remember: the more specific your question, the easier it is to answer, and the more likely it is you’ll get a response.

1.5 Place the Influencer in the Role of Expert

In a recent roundup post I asked: “What’s the single most valuable piece of advice you ever received about succeeding as a blogger?”

But I noticed I wasn’t getting much response.

So I changed the question to: “What’s the single most valuable piece of advice you would give to a first year blogger?”

Immediately I started getting more responses.

The reason? My second question placed the Influencer in the role of an expert helping people with less experience. It works because (a) people want to help others and (b) they want to be seen as experts.

1.6 Avoid questions that will produce similar responses

If you ask: “What is your #1 list building technique?” you can be fairly sure that over half your respondents are going to say a ‘free eBook’ or something to that effect.

That’s not going to result in a very interesting article.

One way to avoid getting similar responses is to ask personal questions such as:

“What was the biggest mistake you made in your first year of blogging?”

3.1 Use an Email Finding Service

The service I’ve had best results with is Hunter, which gives you 150 free searches a month. That’s enough to do a couple of roundups a month!

Just type the domain name into Hunter and it will usually give you at least a couple of verified email addresses:

3.2 Sign up to their Newsletter

If that fails you can always sign up to their newsletter. Most bloggers use their personal email address in the header of the confirmation email (i.e. name@domain.com).

It’s a good practice, in any case, to sign up to the expert’s Newsletter, as that’s another way of getting on their radar.

In the welcome email, Influencers often reach out to new subscribers, asking them what issues they are struggling with. That’s a great opportunity to drop them an email and introduce yourself.

4. Doing the Outreach

Outreach is where you’ll do the bulk of the work involved in putting together a roundup.

4.1 Use an Online Form

An online form makes it really easy for your experts to respond. It also makes it very clear-cut what is required. An online form will make you appear business-like and show that you know what you’re doing.

There are four bits of information you want to collect in the online form:

The expert’s response to the question

The expert’s Bio

The expert’s URL

The expert’s portrait pic (also called a headshot)

I use JotForm as it’s the only free online form that allows the user to upload a photo (Google Forms used to allow uploads, but no longer).

Sign up to JotForm and create your form. Once your form is ready, click on ‘Publish’:

On the next screen, click on ‘Embed’:

Then select the ‘Embed’ option and copy the code:

I create my forms on a WordPress page rather than a post because it gives me more control over the appearance.

This is Rob Powell from www.robpowellbizblog.com. I’m a writer and online entrepreneur and I blog about writing and content marketing.

I’ve seen your name around a lot lately so I decided to check out your site. I really liked this guest post about ________. Absolutely epic! I really liked your point about ____________________________. Anyway, I thought it was so good I just tweeted it to my followers.

I’m putting together an article on tips from a select group of entrepreneurs, and I’d love to include you in that list.

If you have time, here’s the question and a quick form that makes everything a bit easier:

——————————-
If you had to promote your next blog post using just one technique, what would it be, and why? http://www.yourdomain.com/expert-roundup/
——————————-

The deadline to turn this in is ________. The post will be published in the following week and I’ll shoot you over a link to it when it’s live, if you choose to participate.

I’ll include a 2 or 3-line Bio with a link back to your website.

The online form has fields for your Bio, your website URL and an upload link for your photo.

Just 50-100 words would be awesome.

I’ve invited 30 other influential bloggers and I’ll be promoting the post heavily once it goes live.

If you are too busy or it’s not a fit for your brand, I totally understand.

That said, my audience would love to hear your insights.

Hope to hear from you.

All the best,

Key Points in the Initial Outreach:

Name of the Expert

Introduce yourself

You know their website

You’ve read at least one of their blog posts

You liked it because…

You tweeted it to your followers

The Roundup Question plus link to the online form

The deadline (people put things off without a deadline)

A two-line bio with a link back to their website

50 to 100 words would be great

You have invited other experts to contribute

You’ll be promoting it once it is published

If they don’t have time or the question doesn’t fit with their focus, it’s totally fine.

4.5 Include Contributing Experts in your Outreach Email

Once you have responses from 5 experts, include their names and websites in your outreach email.

The psychology of this is that your prospects are more likely to want to participate if they see names they recognize. People don’t want to be left out:

Other experts who have already contributed to my roundup post are:

Name of Influencer A of ‘Name of Blog A’

Name of Influencer B of ‘Name of Blog B’

Name of Influencer C of ‘Name of Blog C’

Name of Influencer D of ‘Name of Blog D’

Name of Influencer E of ‘Name of Blog E’

4.6 Specify a Deadline

Specify a deadline of no more than 7 days away. You want people to take action now. If you don’t give a deadline, or if you give them too long, it will go on the backburner and they’ll forget about it.

4.7 Thank Responders within 24 hours

Thank the experts who respond with a simple email, within 24 hours:

Subject line: [NAME], thanks so much for your input into my roundup article

Hi [NAME], Thanks so much for that!

I’ll keep you posted and will send you a link as soon as the article is live.

All the best,

4.8 Keep Track of your Outreach

Use a spreadsheet to keep track of who you emailed and who responded. You’ll need this to:

Avoid emailing the same expert twice

Send a ‘thank you email’ to all the experts who responded

Send an email once the article is live, asking the expert to share

In my spreadsheet I include a column containing the link to the expert’s article that I tweeted to my followers, as this is information I will need while composing the outreach email.

4.9 Get Noticed by the Expert

When you’re starting out and are completely unknown, it can be hard to get experts to respond. You need to do everything you can to get on their radar.

In either case, they may or may not see your name and take note. But either way, it increases your chances of getting a response to your outreach.

5. Writing the Article

5.1 Analyse and Summarize the Responses

You might think that the main advantage of roundup posts is that you get your article written for you. That’s certainly true. But you still need to do your own analysis and summary of what the experts have said.

A roundup post that just presents the responses of the experts and nothing more is very weak.

One of the reasons you need to analyse and summarize what the experts have said is that your readers may not have time to read the whole article – they just want to get the key takeaways in a nutshell.

So at the end of your roundup post, always include your analysis and summary of what the experts have said.

If the roundup question is not a list-type but asks for an opinion, then the analysis will be bit more involved. But nothing scary!

Just go through the responses and see what the main points are.

Often there will be overlap in the responses. For example, you might have 19 experts who made 11 points.

Create a sub-heading for each point and summarize the point in no more than 3 or 4 sentences. That’s all you need to do!

5.2 Provide a Summary at the Beginning

At the beginning of your roundup post include a brief summary of the key takeaways. This is for readers who are just skimming and want to see the nutshell version.

5.3 Table of Hyperlinked Names

At the start of the your roundup, insert a table of hyperlinked expert names so that readers can quickly navigate to individual responses:

5.4 Include a TL;DR button

Most people who read blog posts are in a rush. They just want to get the gist of it quickly. For these readers it’s very helpful to provide a button near the top of the article that takes them straight to the analysis and summary:

5.5 Include Portrait Pics

Images are vital in any post, as a way of breaking up the text. A portrait pic of your expert is too good an opportunity to miss. Always include a headshot next to the name of your expert:

5.6 Affiliate Links

Roundup posts that ask experts for their ‘top three tools’ for doing something can become evergreen content that will deliver a steady stream of traffic from organic search.

Include some affiliate links and your roundup could bring you a handy stream of passive income for years to come.

5.7 Create a Photo Collage

Images make any blog post more engaging and more shareable and what better image to use in a roundup post than a photo collage of the contributing experts?

There are various online services you can use to create a photo collage, some free (e.g. canva.com) and some paid (e.g. picmonkey.com).

Select all the images in your folder and then click on the ‘Make Collage’ button (second from left):

Then, in the left side pane, use the ‘Grid Spacing Slider’ to adjust the margins between the photos. Then click ‘Create Collage’:

On the next window, click the ‘Export’ button at the bottom of the screen:

On the next screen, make sure the resize slider is set to 800 pixels, and then click ‘Export’:

With some of the online collage making services you’re either limited to a set number of photos per collage or you’ll be left with a grid containing empty spaces. What I like about the Picasa Collage Maker is that it fits the photos to the available space:

5.8 Include an Infographic

Including an Infographic in your Roundup post is one of the factors that will make your post go viral.

To prove my point, let me give you a little case study.

I published two roundup posts. Roundup ‘A’ had 27 contributors, while Roundup ‘B’ had 19 contributors.

Which one do you think got more shares?

You probably guessed Roundup ‘A’ – with 27 experts sharing it with their followers, it had a far greater audience reach than the first.

But it was the other way around.

Roundup ‘A’ received a total of 87 social media shares, while Roundup ‘B’ got 314 shares.

Not only that, but Roundup ‘B’ has gone viral: it’s been weeks since it received any active promotion from either me or the contributors, but every week it gets 10 to 20 new shares:

What made the difference? An Infographic!

The above Infographic was created using a vector graphics app called SketchApp, but there are plenty of online drag-and-drop Infographic makers:

About Rob Powell

Rob Powell lives on the edge of the Great Barrier Reef in north Queensland with his wife and two daughters. He shows beginning bloggers how to create content that will take them to the next level. Download a PDF of this article with 7 BONUS tips.

Hi Phil, thanks so much for your comment! I’m really glad you found my article useful and that it contained some new roundup tips. Thanks so much for sharing on Inbound and Twitter! All the best with your writing 🙂

Hi Rob,
As I mentioned to Erik’s feedback, It is indeed a great pleasure to be with you all and to enjoy the results of your job.
Yes, i enjoyed and indeed a beneficial post.
Keep up the good work.
Keep writing
Keep informed.
Best
~ Phil

Whoa Rob,
This is just a terrific post. Roundup posts are quite in trend these days and almost anyone is doing it. I loved your tips to make roundup posts more effective, less messy and bring the results that they are intended to bring to without more time wastage.
Thanks for your tips.
-Swadhin

Thanks so much for your comment! Really glad that you found it useful. I think roundup posts are maybe the most powerful blogging technique there is. Certainly for beginning bloggers. It makes a great platform for guest posting, because those experts and influencers already know you from your roundup.

Before I start writing the comment, I have bookmarked your awesome post. I would say that you have done a fabulous job!

I have been blogging since 2012 and thus I’m familiar with the importance of networking with the influential bloggers.

And yes, the round-up posts do magic in bringing the targeted traffic but they have to be done with care as you said.

You have provided some wonderful ideas (Questions) and now I have realized my mistake that I have asked a vast question (Which is difficult to narrow down the reply) to the bloggers. As you said, their answers are similar and some of them didn’t respond to my question.

Thank you so much for listing out the valuable resources to find out the emails of the active bloggers, create the round-up form and make the infographic.

Thanks so much Nirmala. Yes, the question is the key to a good roundup. I think it’s worth spending a lot of time crafting a really good question. It’s got to be a question that the experts want to answer and that doesn’t take too long to answer, It’s quite an art! All the best with your next roundup!

Hey Rob,
I am incredibly impressed with your ability as a copywriter as well as with the layout on your blog web page. An expert roundup gives you and your blog authority by association. When you’re seen in the company of influential people, some of that influence naturally rubs off on you. And posts featuring well-known contributors will naturally be perceived as having more value than regular posts.